| The transformation of China’s economy to a high-quality development model has put forward new requirements for the modern financial system,and the management of financial expenditure is transforming to a result oriented performance management.Since the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China,China has accelerated the reform of budget performance management,and the special funds for financial transfer payments have also been included in the budget performance management system.Water conservancy development fund is a kind of transfer payment fund arranged by the central and provincial financial budgets,which plays an important role in the development of water conservancy in China.In order to ensure the effectiveness of the use of this fund,the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Water Resources have carried out performance evaluation on water development funds for five consecutive years since 2017,exposing many problems in the performance management of water development funds.Then,whether these problems exist at the grass-roots level,how their manifestations and causes are,all need to be carefully empirical research.The research may provide more empirical basis for the budget performance management related theories of special funds,and provide policy guidance for the budget performance management of local governments as well.In this paper,the performance management of water conservancy development funds in Mianyang city was studied via literature collection and analysis,field survey,interview,etc.Specifically,firstly,the data on the performance management of water resources development funds in Mianyang City was sorted out and collected in order to be familiar with the management situation in the city.Secondly,based on the theory of public finance,financial performance supervision,and budget performance management especially,the status of water conservancy development was analyzed comprehensively via a four-link management process: performance target management – performance operation monitoring management–performance evaluation management – performance result application management.Thirdly,in order to understand the actual operation of the performance management process of water conservancy development funds in Mianyang with multiple perspectives,interviews were conducted among the staff from the grass-roots who are specifically engaged in the performance management of water development funds,from the municipal authorities,and from the third-party performance evaluation team.Through analysis and research,it was found that there are some problems in the performance management of water conservancy development funds in Mianyang City:(1)the declaration of performance targets is mainly based on the issuance of tasks,(2)unreasonable targets,(3)the lack of monitoring of performance operation and implementation,(4)very limited performance evaluation method is single,(5)the difficulty to identify the benefits,(5)the neglect of performance feedback,and etc.Subsequently,it is concluded that the current immature institutional setting and team construction of the Mianyang water conservancy system,the lack of a comprehensive fund management system,and the lack of a sound performance management mechanism are the main causes of the problems.Furthermore,inspired by the successful experience of performance management reform in foreign countries and the experience of performance management of some special funds in China,countermeasures to improve the performance management of water conservancy development funds in Mianyang city have been proposed,such as establishing the correct concept of performance management,improving the management process of fund performance,and strengthening the result management of performance evaluation. |
